Indeed, the future of all military music troupes may be dimmer as the Pentagon absorbs at least $400 billion in budget cuts over the next decade. Every corner of the defense establishment is bracing for impact, but bands have been directly targeted.

In July, the House passed an amendment that would cap military band spending at $200 million, down from $320 million last year.

The final 2012 defense budget has not yet been passed. But even if the House version doesn’t make it into law, band officials predict that talk of cutting the music budget won’t go quiet.

Navy Band "Southwest"

Navy Band "The Destroyers"

Third Marine Air Wing Band

According to Rep. Betty McCollum, the Minnesota Democrat who wrote the amendment, the military employs 154 uniformed bands. More than 100 of those belong to the Army.

“There is no doubt that military bands are important. We all enjoy listening to military bands and cherish the traditions of military music,” McCollum said.

“But in a time of fiscal crisis, $200 million must be enough for ceremonial music, concerts, choir performance and country music jam sessions.”

Military band members are, by and large, full-time musicians.

Pounding out John Philip Sousa marches is not something they do in addition to swabbing decks — although Marine musicians have put down their instruments and served as security guards in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Most military performers are classically trained.

In the Navy, 70 percent have bachelor’s degrees in music. Two Navy band members sit in with the San Diego Symphony. There’s one sailor-musician in boot camp now who holds a Ph.D., said Lt. Cmdr. Dwaine Whitham, a trombonist who heads the Navy’s music program.

The Navy has 11 fleet bands spread around the world, including the one based in San Diego. It also has two “premiere” bands, one in Washington, D.C., and the other at the Naval Academy in Annapolis, Md.

The salaries of the 694 Navy enlisted musicians and 27 officers make up the bulk of that music program’s cost.

Of the Marine Corps’ 14 bands, four are housed in Southern California.

One is at the Marine Corps Recruit Depot near Lindbergh Field; another is the 3rd Marine Air Wing band at Miramar Marine Corps Air Station; the third is Camp Pendleton’s 1st Marine Division band; the last is at the Twentynine Palms Marine base in San Bernardino County.

For military musicians, these are already lean times.

The Navy has cut back from 55 bands in the 1970s, to 22 in the ’80s, Whitham said. The last drawdown came in the mid-1990s with post-Cold War downsizing.

For Corbliss and the 39 sailors in Navy Band Southwest, the annual budget outside of salaries is $18,000 — to fix instruments, maintain the band’s vans and buy paper and staples.

The band’s travel costs were $32,000 last year — but that was paid by whomever hired them to perform, such as a Fleet Week organization.

“We are budget dust,” said Corbliss, a 50-year-old French horn player who joined the Navy after earning a music degree and teaching school.

He wanted to play music every day, and the Navy gave him that chance. Plus, it offered health care and a pension — both rare in musician circles.

“You can’t deny the fact that things need to be cut, but I think there’s plenty of other gigantic things that could be cut,” Corbliss said.

Military bands

Number of bands

2009

2010

2011

Army

102

102

102

Air Force

24

24

24

Navy

14

14

14

Marine Corps

14

14

14

Total

154

154

154

Expense (in millions)

Army

$134.60

$145.60

$147.30

Air Force

$71.10

$73.70

$76.40

Navy

$46.30

$49.40

$50.60

Marine Corps

$45.20

$48.70

$45.50

Source: Rep. Betty McCollum, D-Minnesota

Uniformed musicians worry that people think military bands only march in Fourth of July parades and play at presidential inaugurations. They do that, but they also travel with Navy ships on goodwill missions to foreign countries.

“Music is music, and everybody gets it. And it’s not scary. A big aircraft carrier, that’s scary. Many admirals’ philosophy is, ‘open with a band, close with a ship,’” Corbliss said.

“Because you go in there, and you have these guys making people feel good about the United States Navy. And they sing and get everyone involved. And the kids love it.”

At least two congressmen agree with him. In a June letter to their colleagues, two members of the Army Caucus argued for protecting Pentagon music funding.

“Bands provide a unique military capability,” said the letter from Republican John Carter and Democrat Silvestre Reyes, both Texans. “They open doors like no other weapon can.”

On American soil, military musicians go to schools with recruiters to help attract future sailors.

For that job, they play whatever music is popular. In San Diego, the sailors have a rock group offshoot called The Destroyers.

“If they cannot sing Katy Perry, I don’t need them. That is all there is to it,” said Corbliss, who appears stern while conducting the band, but when speaking uses phrases like “cool cat,” and “dig it.”

Military bands also play at retirement ceremonies and changes of command — what they call their bread and butter. And they perform at veteran funerals.

The United States can, and does, replace a live bugler with a recorded version of taps. And it could substitute a civilian band for ceremonies. But, for Chief Warrant Officer 2 Jack Davis, director of the 51-member Miramar ensemble, only a Marine Corps band can march as a Marine Corps band.

“At a time of hardship, when the country needs the civilian populace to know the military is fighting for them, when a Marine band marches down the street — that stirs a feeling of patriotism and pride that you are not going to get somewhere else,” Davis said.

Defense analyst Michael O’Hanlon of the Brookings Institution in Washington said that perhaps the United States can’t afford that kind of nicety anymore.

“We’re in tough times, so it’s not good enough to just have a reason. You’ve got to have a reason that’s worth $350 million a year,” he said.

No one in the military music hierarchy knows how large-scale cuts would be carried out by the Pentagon. Whitham said he has seen “budget drills,” but no final decisions.

At the San Diego Naval Base band room, Corbliss says the sailor-musician has the best job in the Navy -- for as long as it lasts.

“The only problem,” he said, “is that we have to keep proving ourselves.”